Beneath the crescent moon
by CuteMcBeauty
Summary: After all's been said and done... Killian has nightmares that keep him up at night after the underworld ordeal. He uses the spyglass in the living room to find his peace. His Swan joins him and finds a way to ease him back into a peaceful slumber.
When it was all said and done, when they had finally managed to find a small moment of peace for themselves and had taken a week off (at Emma's family's behest) completely alone in their new home together, that's when Killian started having trouble sleeping.

Not sleeping per se, but getting a decent night's sleep without his night's rest being shattered by godawful nightmares.

It is one thing to live a villanous life as a pirate, and quite another to live a short span in hell. The latter is far more traumatizing. Especially when your significant other has literally travelled there to try and haul your soul back out. The constant fear of seeing her risk her life for him had taken its toll and now, while Emma seemed to be recovering her long lost sleep, he seems to be losing that uncanny capacity he had always had to turn in unaffected, and sleep like a babe.

Like many other nights, he rises from the bed (their bed), shirtless, soaked in his own sweat, fear racking through every single cell in his renewed and now fully living body. The fear runs deep. Some scars, it seems, are not engraved in the flesh.

He now knows he prefers those to the wounds of the soul.

Usually, emma wakes and soothes him back into a restless slumber; This time, she is idle to his sudden jolt, and he is grateful for that. He looks at her face, lax and unburdened, at least while she sleeps. He has become endeared to the creases in her forehead, the evidence of the burden that being the savior inflicts upon her, day in and day out. But when she sleeps, the burden and the creases seem to vanish together with her daily worries for at least a few blissful hours. Her lips are parted and she snores somewhat like a child does. Sometimes she snores like a bison in musk, he thinks, and it amuses him to no end how forgiving and tolerant he has become to all her strange sleeping quirks and habits. They are even endearing to him. Love has made a tolerant, affectionate man out of an evil pirate.

He envies her a little bit right now. He too, could use a full night's sleep.

Killian exhales as he runs a hand down his rugged face, sliding one leg and then the other out of the bed, carefully trying not to stirr too much and wake Emma. He reaches for his jeans to clad his nude form before tiptoeing out the door and down the stairs, not before taking a quick glance into Henry's room. The teen boy has taken to spending weekends and their place and while Killian loves the time the boy spends with them, he is also concerned about how all the recent events might have affected the selfless young lad, who had volunteered to follow his mother into the Underworld to save him. It made him proud; he could not love Henry more if he were his own.

Seeing the boy splayed out in the bed and possibly drooling into his pillow, Killian continues his way down. His first instinct is to walk to the spyglass Emma had placed there for him, hoping for a clear view of the ocean to soothe his scarred soul enough that he might at least get a couple hours' sleep.

He sighs as he lifts the viewing lens into his eye, and the view does not dissapoint. The crescent moon is high, and it is mirrored neatly over the gente sway of the waves beneath. He pulls away and a smile tugs at his lips before he once again leans in to continue gawking at the silvery halo in the distance.

Still attached to the spyglass, an ancient shanty comes to his lips and he finds himself involuntarily singing softly to himself.

"A sailor there once was, and he loved a maid,

who tethered his heart far away from the shore.

He glanced one last time at silver-lined waves

And loved her till he was a sailor no more."

He falls silent, still absorbed by the view, peace finally flooding his soul.

"You miss the sea…"

He turns sharply, to find a sleepy Emma standing ion the foyer and leaning against the frame.

"Oh…" he heaves. "I'm sorry love… how long have you been standing there?"

She grins and he delighted in the somewhat domestic (and beautiful) form of his woman as she walks to him, clad in pants and a shirt that are far too big for her, her hair flaring outwards, a far cry from her evenly tame locks she sports on a daily basis.

She is still the most beautiful creature on earth to his loving eyes.

"Long enough." She yawns as she runs a hand across his waist, taking the spyglass with her other hand and leaning in to look at the view. She sighs. " Oh wow...Yeah… I can see the appeal, that is a sight." She pulls away and looks at her boyfriend. "Bad dreams again?"

He nods silently and looks down.

"Hmm." She caresses his cheek. "A shot of rum, pirate?"

He chuckles. "Actually, a brew of cocoa and cinnamon like the ones you accustom might just hit the spot this once, Emma."

She pulls him by the hand and leads him to the kitchen. He sits by, watching her as she yawns and goes about making her trademark drink of choice for the two of them. After a few minutes, she finally places a mug of steaming chocolate before him and sits beside him to sip her own.

After a few silent sups, he shakes his head and smirks. "You make a good mug of cocoa, Swan. Trully."

"I know. And trully…" She replies. "…I want to know what it was that made you want to come down here in the first place."

He looks up into her eyes and swallows thickly before he places the mug down and heaves over the table. "It was Cerverus."

"Hades's dog?"

"Aye."

"What happened?"

She can see his eyes shine but he doesn't weep as he talks, his voice unbroken, as if narrating outside of himself. "There was one time… when I helped Megara escape. Bloody hound of hell tried to follow after her so… I baited myself so she could go find you." He gulps. "It's amazing how much physical pain a dead man can feel, Emma. The dog got me by the leg and shook me, like dogs do. It was only because of Hades's command that the beast dragged me alive back to him, or it would have disemboweled me and eaten my innards." He looks up at Emma and this time, his expression sours and his voice breaks. "This time… it was… it was you. I saw you, I saw the beast feasting on you. I was helpless, I could not move, I couldn't even scream, I… I just saw you, you had pain in your face and a blank look in your eyes and… bloody hell…"

Emma winces, not so much at the idea of the three headed dog gutting her as the notion of how Cerverus had actually taken her love by the leg and given him a good hard rattle. She still can't figured out why the hell Hades had taken to torture Killian like he had and the memory of him, bruised, battered and bloddied, was still haunting. She reaches out and grabbs his hand. "It's just a dream, Killian. You're here. You're back."

"Aye… I know that love, I just…" He looks up into her eyes. "It stays with you."

Emma simply held his gaze and sighs. "Yeah… yeah it does." She rubs her thumb against his as she shakes her head. "You know, when I was a kid, I… I had this reocurring nightmare."

"You did?"

"Yeah, there were these people around me. They all turned their backs on me. Repeatedly. And in that dream I was always either choking or… in pain. And no one wanted to help me, everyone just… just…"

"Left you there…."

"Yeah." She scowls at the memory. "It took me a long time to stop having those dreams but like you said, it stayed with me. I said to myself, 'Emma, nobody will ever be there for you, so it's time you toughen up, time you harden, because it's either that, or you won't survive'… Life was cruel…" She shruggs. "So the dreams stopped, but… without knowing it, I turned it into my reality. Being alone. Walls up. So no one ever came too close. I wouldn't let them."

"Don't I know it." He grins at her with affection. "But then…"

She smiles and chuckles as she squeezes his hand. "The along comes this stubborn pirate with an attitude and takes it upon himslef to break down all those walls."

"That would be me."

"Yep."

He sighs and gives her a dimpled, loving grin. "It's been my pleasure. Honestly. I do like being the one to get through to you. I like that you trust me, and that somehow you always did, well.." He holds his hand up and rolls his eyes at her. "Except for that moment when you left me chained up there, but since then… It's been quite a ride my love."

"Well…" She places her folded arms on the table and leans forward. "Maybe now it's my turn to tell you… I love you. I'm not going anywhere, Hook."

He grins and leans forrward too, and they meet in the middle with a gente kiss, their foreheads touching gently afterwards as he caresses his cheek. "I love you too."

"You ok now?"

"I will be..." He shruggs shyly. "We've been through a very tough couple of months, what with you being the dark one, then me, then the underworld..."

"Killian..." She caresses his cheek. "MY nightmares haunted me when you were still dead and I had no idea I could get you from the underworld." She shakes her head. "I don't want to lose you ever again. Ever."

"You won't."

"You keep saying that and look what happened."

"Emma, you're not the only one afraid to lose the ones she loves. I'm having bloody nightmares now."He holds her close. "I'd rather die all over again than to see your demise."

"Yeah it goes around." She says before kissing the tip of his nose and leaning back. "But for now... we have a quiet moment."

He smiles. "It would appear so."

"Come on. Finish your cocoa and let's go back to bed."

He nodds and sips some more of the brew before he stands up. "All set, Swan."

She takes the cups from the table and places them into the sink when Killian sees her hesítate. He doesn't have to see her face to know something's in her mind; he klnows her heart much too well.

"Swan?" he paces to her and wraps hand and stump around her waist. "What's the matter, love?"

She leans back into his embrace. "That… song you were singing…"

"Aye…"

She turns around and metes his gaze. "Do you… feel like I tethered you? Like… you can't sail any more because you're here, on land, with me?"

He laughs softly and hugs her to himself. "Aye. And I would do it again a thousand times. And I can sail any time I wish Swan, but it's with you where I belong."

"But…"

"Ah ah ah!" He holds his finger to her face and playfully bops her nose. "I belong here, with you, Emma Swan. Zeus's orders, now. We do NOT go against the will of the gods."

She smiles fully, happily, and stands on the tips of her toes to kiss him again. "Good point. But maybe… we should go on a trip. On the Jolly Roger. Just… anchor off shore somewhere for a few days, the two of us. To bring some salt and sea back into those lungs of yours…"

"Sounds like a dream, love."

"Better dream than getting gutted by a three-headed dog."

"Certainly."

She sighs and pulls him. "Come on, pirate. Let's get back to bed."

The don't sleep right away; they make love, slowly, concienciously, learning and loving, and then fall into each others' arms for a snooze as the sun comes up.

Killian then dreams of sailing on peaceful silver waves, his heart tethered to the hand of a blond siren in a pink dress, her hands on the helm, beneath a silver crescent moon.


End file.
